Episode 195: Tech Talks: The Rolfson Father-Daughter Duo on Innovation & Opportunities with Dale & Abi Rolfson

Episode notes

A father-daughter conversation:

Hello Smart Firefighting Community!

Welcome to another episode of covering real world innovations via interviews with fire service and technology industry experts that empower YOU to develop your very own Smart Firefighting strategy!

Thanks for joining our 16 part FRST Challenge Mini Series recorded at the competition! Tracking and situational awareness has long been a problem for first responders. That's why the FRST Challenge competition is designed to pinpoint 3D tracking technologies that provide one-meter accuracy for first responders in indoor environments, crucial for enhancing their safety during rescue operations.

The 6 finalist teams competed in localization and ruggedization tests at Muscatatuck Urban Training Center from October 23-27, 2023. Winning teams gain access to funding, business support, and live field testing opportunities to evolve their solutions for real-world application.

In this episode:

Explore new technological frontiers in public safety

Discover how generational collaboration can foster innovation in emergency response technology

The unique dynamics of family partnership in pushing the boundaries of tech development

Find out from Dale Rolfson and Abi Rolfson .

Dale is the Chief Technology Officer at the Indianapolis Fire Department , and was their Information Technology Manager for more than 34 years.

His daughter Abi attends Indiana University and is currently interning with the iSite project at IU's Crisis Technologies Innovation Lab in collaboration with San Francisco Communications. She's also an Undergraduate Instructor at Indiana University's Luddy School of Informatics, Computing, and Engineering.

So click play now to hear what they have to share, and stay tuned for the rest of our mini series!

Head to www.smartfirefighting.com to discover how SFF accelerates innovation for emergency responders, to find out when our next event is, or review our curated resources!

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Chapters

1. 0:00 Intro
2. 1:07 Meet Dale and Abi Rolfson
3. 1:39 How the week went
4. 2:20 Abi's work as a test assistant
5. 3:17 How the test data was collected
6. 4:38 Judging the teams
7. 6:13 Why location data matters to command
8. 7:42 Why this competition needed to happen
9. 8:34 Abi's capstone virtual walkthrough
10. 10:00 Simulations and the command dashboard
11. 10:56 Using tracking data in training
12. 12:51 Why Abi works in public safety
13. 14:05 Dale on 36 years and what excites him
14. 15:40 Public safety as a value creator
15. 16:11 Takeaways from the week
16. 18:24 Final thoughts
17. 20:46 Outro

Questions answered in this episode

What is the FRST Challenge and what is its goal?

The FRST Challenge aims to produce marketable prototypes that demonstrate indoor localization tracking of first responders within one meter accuracy without any pre-deployed infrastructure. Phase five increased the challenges by including multiple responders, longer durations, and longer distances.

Hear it at 0:00

Why is tracking first responders in three dimensions important?

Dale Rolfson says incident commanders want to see where their people are for resource allocation, to see the scene and allocate resources to best mitigate the situation. It is also critical if there is a down police officer or firefighter, to locate them as fast as possible to save them.

Hear it at 6:57

How can indoor tracking technology be used for training firefighters?

Dale Rolfson explains you can take a recruit class through a burn structure or search building, then go back and show them the data of what they did versus what they should do. This gives them positive feedback and critique, which dramatically increases the learning curve for firefighters or police officers.

Hear it at 10:56

What is Abi Rolfson working on for her capstone project?

Abi Rolfson is creating a full virtual walkthrough of one of the buildings at Muscatatuck, the Fire Trainer. It uses an AI pathfinding algorithm to have an avatar walk through the building between monuments placed according to the phase five fire trainer scenario, and serves as an example of what a future incident commander's dashboard could look like, showing all floors at once with dots for first responders in real time.

Hear it at 9:12

What does Dale Rolfson think is critical about funding new technology for first responders?

Dale Rolfson says time is critical in situations like finding victims in burning structures, and everyone talks about how you cannot put a price on a life. But in many cases local governments decide that price is not very high because they are not spending money on available technology. He says we have to find ways to fund new technology initiatives to help first responders protect the community.

Hear it at 14:33

Transcript

Machine transcript of the published audio. Names may be misspelled and some sections are missing.

Ep 195 transcript

Tech Talks: The Rolfson Father-Daughter Duo on Innovation & Opportunities with Dale & Abi Rolfson

Speakers: Kevin Sofen, Abi Rolfson, Dale Rolfson

Source: Whisper medium.en machine transcription of the published Podbean audio (no original transcript found in Drive), lightly cleaned. Speakers were separated by voice clustering and then checked and assigned by hand at every speaker change. Gaps where the model returned no usable text are marked [inaudible m:ss].

[0:00] Kevin Sofen: Hello, everyone, and welcome to a new Smart Firefighting mini-series created during the phase five of the FRST Challenge, hosted at the Muscatatuck Urban Training Center. The FRST Challenge focus is to produce marketable prototypes that demonstrate indoor localization tracking of first responders within one meter accuracy without any pre-deployed infrastructure. Many of you heard stories from phase four, and here in phase five, the challenges were increased by including multiple responders, longer durations, and longer distances. In these conversations, you will hear from many of the entrepreneurs, first responders, and team members involved that address these challenges and opportunities of X, Y, and Z axis tracking from multiple perspectives around scalability, usability, affordability, and more. This challenge is administered by the Indiana University Crisis Technologies Innovation Lab and funded by the NIST Public Safety Communication Research PSCR Division. Also, consider putting the NIST 5x5 Conference on your calendar, located in Chicago, June 25th to 27th, 2024. Enjoy this deep dive into first responder tracking technology, and please reach out with your thoughts. We are here back at HQ on the final day, and this is a first in the Smart Firefighting Podcast, at first, with a father-daughter combo. I'm sitting alongside the Battalion Chief and CTO of Indianapolis Fire Department, Dale Rolfson and his daughter, who just had her 21st birthday yesterday, Allie, who is a junior at Indiana University, Luddy School of Informatics. How are you both doing today?

[1:37] Abi Rolfson: Good. Doing good, yeah.

[1:39] Kevin Sofen: Well, it's been a beautiful week, and actually today it's raining. I guess it's fitting on the final day. But just from the perspective, I mean, Dale, you were here in phase four, now phase five, and Allie, you were here in phase five. happened this week?

[1:54] Dale Rolfson: Well it was a good week. I think the temperatures were a little warmer than we expected so I also participated in the challenge and wore all of the equipment and went through the scenarios so I would have liked the temperatures a little cooler but it was very impressive to see the teams, how they worked, how they are trying to solve this important problem for all of us in public safety.

[2:20] Kevin Sofen: What was it like from your perspective now? I mean I know you've been working on this and supporting David in the lab I mean from kind of all the work going into it and now being here in person like what was what was it like this week for you Allie? Abi oh my goodness.

[2:37] Abi Rolfson: So well I worked on placing the monuments for the phase five scenarios and this week I was a test assistant so I was following the scenario role players, is that what we call them?

[2:51] Dale Rolfson: Role players, participants.

[2:52] Abi Rolfson: Yeah, the role players in the scenarios and scanning the NFC tags to send time data for when they were hitting the monuments. And it was very gratifying to see the monuments that David Coggeshall and I placed in the buildings and to see them in real life. It was great. It was very gratifying.

[3:17] Kevin Sofen: It was really cool to see both of you in the field when, Dale, you were wearing the PPE and going in and actually doing exercise and you were behind him and doing the scanning. For those of us that weren't here and didn't see that, talk me through that process a little bit more from when the first responders were outside, they're standing on a waypoint and then they start going through and then someone, not a judge, but a facilitator was walking behind them, scanning these different spots. what was happening in that process and why was that important within the data collection process?

[3:51] Abi Rolfson: Yeah, so basically for test assistants, we would, at first, at the starting points, there would be an NFC tag and once they count down five, four, three, two, one for the scenario to start, we would scan the starting point and then when you take a phone and scan the NFC tag, it activates a shortcut in the phone that starts a five second timer. And that way we can, after the five second timer is over, the data, the time data from this person hitting that specific monument is placed in a notes document. And then this time data from the whole scenario from every single time the tags are scanned is then compared against competitor data.

[4:38] Kevin Sofen: I saw Rhonda and her team just sitting there, real time, taking in all this data and synthesizing it. So I mean there's quite a bit of thinking that went into it and then just great execution on everyone within the team. And then Dale, you were a judge, you know, there was this huge team that was helping create this data and kind of teed up for you and the judges to help provide context to ultimately make a decision, what was that process like in terms of receiving data and then kind of even deliberating in the kind of the last two days of figuring out what's gonna happen here?

[5:19] Dale Rolfson: Right, you know, so there's several variables that we're looking at or categories when you're judging and so usability, so each role player such as myself would do our own evaluation of the equipment and what we thought our impressions, and that has a small play into the overall score. So obviously the majority of that score is gonna be based on their performance as hitting X, Y, and Z. So as far as them bringing in the data, it's amazing how fast that transfer took place and where other vendors were coming in and they could hit the server, grab that data, and give us augmented reality views of where responders were inside, which is really cool to see as well.

[6:13] Kevin Sofen: I was impressed among many things, but seeing that data that was going to the cloud and then seeing these different commanding tech challenges and cherry challenge teams taking that data real time and displaying it in AR and VR on 2D screen. And I mean, that's, again, this whole competition is to get a dot on the map in some capacity, but then it's also being able to provide the situational awareness or help develop situational awareness in the scene. And Dale, from your perspective with the fire service, why is this competition so important? And why is this ultimately moving towards, and a lot of the NIST challenges, too, from getting data on map to then visualizing it, why does that matter?

[6:57] Dale Rolfson: Well, there's several reasons. The first one that comes to mind is when you're an incident commander when you're looking at an incident, you wanna see where your people are at, where the firefighters are located, where the police officers and the EMTs are located, so that resource allocation, right? So you can look at the scene, what you are seeing, and then look at where your resources are at and allocate them to as best as possible to resolve or mitigate the situation. So another important reason is in the event that we have a down police officer, down firefighter, and having the ability to locate them as fast as possible to get to them and try to save them.

[7:42] Kevin Sofen: In your perspective, why do you think, or what was like the, what's the significance, or why did this competition need to happen?

[7:52] Abi Rolfson: Good question. So, I mean, I agree with what you said about if someone is down in the building, right, then having this kind of software to track someone and know where they are is very, is going to be much more useful than doing a relay of radio transmissions, trying to figure out where someone is and trying to rescue them, right? And I think it's also important just to bring together all these teams and create a challenge for them to push them to innovate and to create technology that is both accurate and usable for first responders.

[8:34] Kevin Sofen: And there's so many pieces that go into making this happen, but Abi, within the work that you're doing, I mean, I was overlooking your shoulder the other day, and I know within your capstone, your project you're working on, there's a lot that is kind of an important part of this whole, again, creating context and developing situational awareness for first responders in the scene, and part of that is pre-mapping, part of that is understanding the buildings, part of that's just kind of being able to understand the full scope of what's going on. From the screen I was looking at and overlooking your shoulder the other day, what are you working on in school right now and how does that tie into this whole conversation?

[9:12] Abi Rolfson: Yeah, so I'm currently completing my capstone project to finish my informatics degree at IU. And the goal of my capstone project is to create a full virtual walkthrough of one of the buildings here in Muscatatuck. So for my project, I chose the Fire Trainer, which is the first scenario that we did Tuesday morning. And currently it is utilizing an AI pathfinding algorithm in order to have an avatar walking through the building, finding a path between each monument that has been placed into the building according to the phase five fire trainer scenario. And yeah, so. Is there something about tying it into the competition?

[10:03] Kevin Sofen: Yeah, I mean, there's this whole getting dot on map, but part of it's, you know, I think the mapping of it, part of it's the, and then also, somewhat even, there's been a lot of talk of using this tech within training and being able to sort of play Monday morning quarterback. I mean, I saw like, you know, these simulations and these walkthroughs, I mean, why is that helpful? And what's kind of the point of it in your perspective?

[10:28] Abi Rolfson: Yeah, so the simulation that I've created, I hope, serves as an example of what a future incident commander's dashboard could look like, showing all three floors at once. Or all floors, but for the fire trainer, there's three floors. So showing all floors at once and showing the dots for the first responders in the building all in real time.

[10:56] Dale Rolfson: You know, another aspect of this that we haven't even touched on is training. We talked a lot about as far as incident commander and on a fire ground or a major incident, this can also be used for training. So you take a recruit class and you take them through a fire trainer, some sort of burn structure or search building, and then you can go back and take that data and show them this is what you did and this is what we want you to do so critique them give them some positive feedback and maybe open their eyes a little bit on to here's the right thing and this is why I failed on this part you know and then I think that it will dramatically increase the learning curve for firefighters or police officers.

[11:50] Kevin Sofen: Similar but different I know with the Berks reality training where it's being able to get these sets and reps, but especially being able to record the VR scenario and then play it back and kind of talk you through why did you do what you did. And again, especially in training environments, luckily they're supposed to be safer environments to where you can fail, but it's practical and helpful to be like, well, based on where you are and how you entered this door, why did you turn right? And again, it's not that we're kind of being draconian and overlooking your shoulder, but it's using this information to help you make better decisions throughout operations.

[12:25] Abi Rolfson: Yes, definitely. And to give them a visual representation of what they did.

[12:30] Dale Rolfson: Yes. So it's, you know, everybody's got an iPhone with Google Maps or Apple Maps, and we can see our location at all times, but we don't get that elevation, you know, and it's so critical when you're in multi-story structures and locating people.

[12:51] Kevin Sofen: So I think just spending the time with both you this week and even here on this podcast, Abi, it's apparent the apple does not fall far from the tree in terms of just kind of like what you're working on and both of your kind of brilliance and passion for this industry. Abi, why, and maybe this is an easy or softball question, why are you working on what you're working on? How did you end up getting into a focus of doing stuff within public safety and for first responders?

[13:19] Abi Rolfson: Well, it's certainly a field I'm familiar with my father being a firefighter for many years and still CTO at IFT. I also work in search and rescue with the Indiana Task Force One. So yeah, I want the work that I do to make a difference. I mean, it's also nice to create entertaining games in Unity, but it's also, I feel, for me, it's more gratifying to utilize something like a game engine and utilize it for a practical purpose, right? Or a purpose that serves the community.

[14:03] Kevin Sofen: Yeah. Well said. And Dale, you've been in the fire service for how many years?

[14:10] Dale Rolfson: In my 36th.

[14:11] Kevin Sofen: In your 36th. You know, in 36 years in, what, and even kind of at this challenge, like, what excites you right now and what do you know obviously this is about an indoor localization challenge so you could speak on that but i'd love to hear kind of what you're thinking about what's kind of across your desk in regards to how you're best supporting the indianapolis fire department but also thinking about the fire service at large

[14:33] Dale Rolfson: sure well obviously the 3d localization is a major project and a difficult challenge i mean if it was easy the military would already have it and they don't have it. So I'm also looking at technology that can help the firefighter when they go in, how they can see inside a burning structure through the smoke and be able to either get to the seat of the fire faster or find a victim and get them into a fresh, safe environment, fresh air, safe environment. So I think time is critical in those situations where you know how do you put a price on a life. You know everybody talks about you know how do you put a price on a life but in many cases our local governments decide that price is not very high because we're not spending the money on the technology that's available and we should be. We got to find ways to fund these new technology initiatives that are out there to help our first responders protect the community.

[15:40] Kevin Sofen: Couldn't agree more and I mean Stefan and I talked earlier about the change in the narrative of the fire service in certain ways of not just looking at the fire service as a cost driver but as a value creator in terms of having safety as a KPI of a city of a smart city and I think that's again doing stuff like this continuing to change the conversation on and why public safety is not something you, kind of like, oh, we have to do this, but it's like, we want to do this because it's gonna be beneficial for everything. But so, to kind of bring it back to FRST for a second, from both of your weeks here in wonderful Muscatatuck, driving around last night, I was like, this place kind of feels like home in a weird way. What were some of your biggest takeaways from this week? And maybe some aspects of what you're hopeful for, or stuff that you're excited about, or stuff that you're maybe still worried about. and these sort of things that caught your attention from this week?

[16:35] Dale Rolfson: Me personally, I would say during the mealtime and watching the team starting to collaborate. You know, it looks like perhaps some partnerships may form out of this. I don't know. But the sharing of knowledge in trying to solve this common problem. It's not, you know, everybody's competitive and wanting to win this challenge. There's money on the table and that sort of thing. but I think they're all passionate about solving this problem and helping us. And that, I am very grateful for them for doing that.

[17:11] Kevin Sofen: Abi.

[17:13] Abi Rolfson: That's a very good one. I definitely, that's definitely a takeaway for me as well, again, the social aspect, really. Big takeaway for me, how everyone, not just the teams, but how everyone is connecting. We've got judges and FRST admin. We've got FRST admin people and we've also got like the judges and the teams connecting. We've got the FRST team and the teams connecting vendors coming in. Yeah. Vendors coming in. Yeah. Just the all around melting pot of knowledge really. Yeah.

[17:50] Kevin Sofen: That's a wonderful thing that there's this magic in the room and you can see it even right now at breakfast, you know, I see everyone just chopping it up, talking to shop. And I mean, I think I've heard a few people say that some of this problem and the challenges we face are too big for one entity to solve themselves. So it's critical that we check our egos at the door and we find a way to collaborate because it's not, yes, companies need to make money, but we need to, at times, put that to the side and figure out how can we actually move the ball forward to help first responders do their job better, faster, safer, so they can go home at night.

[18:23] Dale Rolfson: Amen.

[18:24] Kevin Sofen: So kind of maybe a final volleyball set here of a mic drop of sorts has been the theme of this mini-series podcast of both of you, of a quote, a question, an insight, a challenge. Any sort of final thoughts that both of you could leave with us here today?

[18:43] Dale Rolfson: Well, I think I've really said everything. I love the fact that these people are so genuine and working so hard to solve this issue. and their willingness to share their technology and their insight, the knowledge that they've gained to maybe push someone else, maybe it'll trigger a thought that someone will have that aha moment that brings us to the next point where this technology just gets out there for us to start using. And thank you to them. I appreciate all of their efforts and what they're doing and you can't put a price on that.

[19:21] Kevin Sofen: Well said. Now it's your turn.

[19:25] Abi Rolfson: No, I mean, I appreciate everyone's curiosity coming up to, especially during Demo Day, coming up to each table, each presentation, and actively engaging with what the person is showing, and showing interest, right? It was very nice to see, definitely.

[19:45] Kevin Sofen: I will tweet in seconds, everything you both said. And I will say surprising, but most special things this week for me was seeing Hayley and her dad. And I guess uncle as well, and in seeing you two and just kind of.

[20:05] Dale Rolfson: It makes it very special when you can share that with a family member.

[20:09] Kevin Sofen: Yeah, it's bigger than one competition, one challenge. And I mean, you two literally are our family. But so is so is everyone in the fire service, brothers and sisters across. And we're here to help in wanting to move forward. And Abi, we need bright minds like you just continue to push the envelope and just continue to find ways to leverage technology to help us do our jobs better. So Abi, thank you for what you're doing, and Dale, just a pleasure to know you and collaborate with you. And yeah, just thank you both and look forward to continuing to collaborate. Until next time. Thanks for listening to today's episode. What did you think? What'd you learn? Hopefully something, right? Please reach out on social media with your thoughts on this episode and any other suggestions for future content. We look forward to capturing more important stories across public safety and are here at your service.